Travis Kalanick explains a champion's mindset as giving 100% effort and bouncing back from setbacks. He contrasts playing not to lose, a fear-driven approach, with playing to win, which requires risk and fearlessness. Successful people across sports, music, and business all adopt this winning attitude.
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Good morning, Believe Nation!
Today's message is: Have a champion's mindset. Over to you, Travis Kalanick.
The champion's mindset. I think a lot of people hear the word champion, they think of a famous sports star. You might think of, in the US, you might think of Michael Jordan or LeBron James going and dunking on somebody. But we think of it differently, and we think of it as, well, when you get on the field, put everything you have into it. Put every ounce of energy you have on the field. Leave nothing on the field. And two, when you get knocked down, because if you're an entrepreneur, inevitably you will be, When you see hard times and you get knocked down, get back up. And if you keep putting everything you got into it and you keep getting back up when you get knocked down, it's almost impossible to fail.
Cool, so what do you think?
I absolutely love this topic, champion's mindset. So I think, first thing that popped in my mind is, are you playing not to lose?
Mm.
Versus, are you playing to win? I think for so many people, and I know you've interviewed some amazing people, and I'm just, you know, just started my podcast just a little while ago. We've had some amazing people on. The pattern that I've seen, even just under 100 interviews, is that the people that really wanted to do something, that really did something that was, you know, that they got some notoriety for, that they went and actually pursued their passion and made it happen, those people always, almost always played to win. They were willing to risk it all. They were willing to put it on the line. For some people, that might not be the answer that they want to hear. Maybe they want to have a more balanced approach. Maybe it's about, you know, you know, feeling like you're ready. But the truth is you're never ready. It's never the perfect time, right? And so if you're playing not to lose, you're always playing a bit scared, right? You're letting fear beat your mind over everything else. But if you're playing to win, you're a little bit fearless. And you don't know what can happen, and that's where we're living in possibility, right? That's where some crazy stuff can happen, where people go, "Oh my God, I can't even believe, you know, that it took off in the way that it did." That's literally what popped into my mind.
I like it, I like it. It's also one of the reasons why, you know, when I started doing the videos, the top 10 and Espressos and all that, we would only do entrepreneurs. It was always entrepreneurs because that's my core audience is entrepreneurs. I know a lot of people listen to your show are entrepreneurs too. And then we started getting a bunch of requests that were not entrepreneurs. Can you do Michael Jordan? Now, I mean, he owns, you know, sure, businesses and stuff, but it's not what he's necessarily known for. Or can you do this soccer player? Can you do this musician? Can you use politician or inventor? And at the start I was hesitating because I'm not sure that these guys are entrepreneurial enough to be on the channel, what we're looking for. But then in listening to the interviews they were giving, it's all the same stuff. It's all success, right? Like you can apply the lessons from Michael Jordan or Beyoncé or Messi to your business to be a better entrepreneur because it's about having the champion's mindset. It applies to any area. If you look at any industry, whoever's at the top has a champion's mindset. And so I love learning from people who've had success in different fields and applying it to, to myself, my life, my business. And so I've been able to learn from it. Now this guy, Travis, obviously is an entrepreneur, but you can learn the champion's mindset from anybody who's had success in their respective fields.
So the question of the day today is, are you playing not to lose or are you playing to win?
I like it. Leave it down in the comments. We're gonna join in the discussion. Thank you guys so much for watching. Have an amazing day. Continue to believe or whatever your one word is. And we'll see you again tomorrow morning for another shot of en-spresso. I wake up every morning, espresso keep me going.
